Device for sorting and feeding refuse.



W. S. PARSONS.

DEVICE FOR SORTING AND FEEDING REFUSE. APPLICATION man FEB. 3. 1913.

1,138,245. Patented May 4,1915.

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WILLIAM STEEL rARsoNs, or LADYWELL, ENGLAND, ssIeNoR r0 3'. STONE &coMrANY, LIMITED, or nnrrronn, ENGLAND.

DEVICE FOR SOR'IING AND FEEDING REFUSE.

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Specification of Letters Patent.

Patented May 4,1915.

Application filed February 3, 1913. Serial No. 746,020.

To all whom it may concern:

Be it known that I, WILLIAM STEEL PAR- soNs, a subject of theKing ofGreat Britain, and resident of No. 131 Embledon road, Ladywell, in thecounty of Kent, England, have invented new and useful Improvements inDevices for Sorting and Feeding Refuse, of which the following is aspecification.

This invention relates to improvements in selective or sorting deviceswhich are appli- A cable to apparatus for discharging ashes and otherrefuse particularly from ships. Heretofore, hoppers have been providedwith a grid to prevent the entry of unduly large objects, and they havebeen formed with a slanting side or sides down which the materialfalling through the grid slides by gravity, or is otherwise caused tomove, so as to be discharged from the hopper. in grids, or similarselective or sorting devices, heretofore used on board ship incombination with ash and clinker discharge apparatus, provision was madeonly for dealing with material or objects according to two dimensions,that is to say, only the dimensions of the cross-sectional area of anobject were taken into account, supposing the cross-section of theobject approaching the grid to be in a plane perpendicular to thedirection of the passages through the grid. Or, in other words, the gridonly dealt with objects according to the width and thickness of thoseobjects and no account was taken of the length. Thus it came about thatvery often objects of considerable length, such as steel bolts, werepassed to an apparatus because the Width and thickness were suitable,whereas such objects should not have been passed as their length wasquite. unsuitable for the apparatus to deal with them. It will beobvious that if an object is passed having for example a length which isgreater than the diameter of the aperture through which it is to bedischarged, such object may get fixed across the said aperture and chokethe discharge passage or orifice.

The object of the present invention is to provide in connection with thehopper for feeding ash and clinker discharge apparatus, a selectivedevice which has the capacity-for dealing with the dimensions of objectsin threedirections so that objects are selected .or sorted cubically andthus it will be no longer possible, if such a device is employed,

Now I for objects of unsuitable length to pass through a grid, even ifthe width and thickness are such as to enable such an object to enterthe grid.

According to this invention the hopper for feeding material to ash orclinker discharging apparatus is provided with a grid which is soarranged, or the passages through which grid are so formed thatselection according to the three dimensions is performed upon materialwhich is fed through the grid to the discharging apparatus. Therefore,while the apertures in the upper surface of the grid deal with two ofthe dimensions of an object deposited upon or passing through the grid,the relation of the lower surface of the grid to the bottom or slopingside of the hopper of the discharge apparatus, or the formation of thegrid passages deals with the third dimension so that although an objectmay pass freely through the said apertures it will be arrested by thegrid if its length be abnormal. The openings of the grid are preferablysquare or circular in plan, or they, may be square with rounded or cutoff corners, or slightly oblong; but preferably the dimension in onedirection should not greatly exceed that in the other.

It has of course been heretofore proposed to support sieves and siftingdevices above an imperforated surface, and it has also been proposed toemploy angle plate sieves for sorting long objects such as oats fromround or shorter objects such as wheat. This invention, however, is onlyconcerned with the protection of ashes discharging apparatus such as isused on board ship against clogging and choking, which may, if theyoccur, seriously hinder the working'of the ship; and this protection isafforded as aforesaid by providing the hopper of such dischargeapparatus with a cubically selective grid arrangement which operates inthe manner hereinafter particularly described.

In order to enable this invention to be readily understood reference ismade to the accompanying drawings in which Figure 1 is a view partly inperspective and partly in vertical section of one arrangement of gridand hopper according to the present invention. Figs. 2 and 3 arevertical sections of modifications. Fig. 4: is a view partly inperspective and partly in vertical section of yet another constructionand arrangement of grid and hopper. Figs. 5 and 6 are plans illustratinggrids formed of assemblages of bars.

Referring to the arrangement illustrated by Fig. 1, a is the hopperwhich in this example is formed with a sloping bottom I). The mouth ofthis hopper is closed by a grid 0 which may be composed of an assemblageof bars, as hereinafter described with reference to Figs. 5 and 6, ormay be cast in one piece. The bars or ribs (Z (Z forming the grating orgrid are all of equal depth and the bars at or both the bars d and almay be thinner at the bottom than at the top. The side or bottom 6 ofthe hopper is arranged at, say, an angle of 45, but the angle may begreater or less as desired, and the bottoms of the bars are preferablyequidistant from the bottom 7) of the hopper while the top surfaces ofthe bars d d are about parallel to the plane of the hopper bottom I). Itwill be readily understood that, if material is fed on to the top of thegrid 0, all pieces of a suitable size will pass through the grid on tothe hopper bottom I) and will then pass down the pipe or chute e. If,however, a piece f of suitable width and thickness but of excessivelength passes through-the grid 0, the lower end of such object comes torest against the bottom 6 before the upper end of the piece has left thegrid. Consequently the piece f is prevented from passing to the pipe orchute e by reason'of its unsuitable length and may be removed at anytime in a suitable manner, as for example, by closing the entrance tothe pipe or chute e and lifting the grating or grid.

According to another construction illustrated in Fig. 2 the planecontaining the top surfaces of the bars (Z d is about horizontal and thebottom or side I) of the hopper is inclined more or less, according tothe slope required for the material to slide freely toward the outlet ordischarge 6 of the hopper a. The bars (Z, or the barsd al as in Fig. 1,are thinner below than on top and the bars d are progressively madedeeper and the bars d gradually deeper toward thedeeper end of thehopper, that is to say toward the left hand side of Fig. 2, so that allpoints on the lower edges of the bars are equidistant from the slopingbottom or side 6 of the hopper. Thus the material may be fed on to thehorizontal grating or grid surface and those pieces which are ofsuitable dimensions in two directions will pass through the apertures ofthe grid and any of such pieces, as for example pieces similar to thatmarked f, having a third dimension which is excessive, will be arrestedin the same way as described with reference to Fig.1.

WVhere gravity is not depended upon for discharging the material whichis passed by the grid, the angle of slope of the bottom I) of the hoppermay be less and might even disappear, particularly when, as is the casewith some ashes discharging apparatus, a stream of water from a jet 9,Fig. 3, is di rected down or along the bottom or sloping side I) of thehopper to wash down or convey away the ashes and other refuse toward theoutlet 6 of'the hopper, whence they are discharged, for example, by astream of Water which is forced through a discharge pipe and out intothe sea below the water line of the vessel. In the example shown in Fig.3 the angleof the sloping bottom 6 may be about 30, or less, to thehorizontal plane.

According to another modification, illustrated in Fig. 4c, the bars (Zare somewhat curved while the bars d are straight or flat and with sucha construction of bars the lower edges of the latter may all beequidistant from the bottom 6 of the hopper a by making the bars 03progressively deeper as described with reference to Fig. 2.

The grid may for instance be divided into sections in vertical orhorizontal planes, or some or all of the bars may be made removable asshown for example in Figs. 5 and 6. In Fig. 5 each bar d is shown formedseparately and mounted in say a frame j. Each bar is formed with aseries of projections so that, when the bars (Z are in place,corresponding projections on the various bars aline with one another andcompose the bars d of the grid. The bars 03 may have end projectionswhich may be seated in recesses in the side members of the frame 1' soas to properly position the bars (Z and to enable any bar to be removed,without disturbing others. In Fig. 6, each bar 01 is formed with aseries of. projections and byassembling the bars d in the frame j theprojections in this case compose the bars (1 as will be readilyunderstood. Of course instead of the square holes shown in Figs. 5 and6, round holes may be employed or the corners of the square holes may berounded. Also the holes may in some cases be slightly oblong.

I claim 1. A device for sorting and feeding refuse comprising a hopper,a selective or sorting grid covering the hopper and the passages throughwhich have entry apertures of a predetermined area, a surface arrangedat a predetermined distance beneath the exit apertures of said passages,and means adapted to discharge to one side of said grid objects capableof passing through said grid and freely deposited on said surface.

2. A devicefor sorting and feeding refuse comprising a hopper, aselective or sorting device comprising a grid covering the hopper andcomposed of an assemblage of independent bars each formed with a seriesof teeth for the formation of the apertures of said grid, said gridbeing arranged in selective relation with a surface in said bars of saidgrid being parallel with the bothopper. tom of said hopper and at apredetermined 3. A device for sorting and feeding refuse distancetherefrom. comprising a hopper having an inclined bot- WILLIAM STEELPARSONS. 5 tom, a selective or sorting device compris- Witnesses:

ing a grid in the upper end of said hopper, O. J. WoR'rH, the planecontaining the bottom edges of the W. MORBEY.

Copies of this patent may be obtained for five cents each, by addressingthe Commissioner of Patents, Washington, D. G.

